At Attention
by TheDoublemintTwins11
Summary: Luffy and Zoro mess with some marines and teach a marine captain an important lesson in the process: when your soldiers are prone to following your orders to the letter, you should really be careful about your wording... :Slight ZoLu, could be nakamaship:


**My sister and I each decided we'd write a picture-prompt story. So we browsed through some pictures and eventually offered each other one (because we figured it would be better if we chose for each other). Well, she decided to be cute and give me this picture: **

**http:// velox - mortis . deviantart . com/art/Swear-37921972 **

**(remove spaces and copy if you want to see it) honestly, I don't think she actually expected me to write a one shot off this, but I did. 'tis mostly humor, and actually doesn't have much to do with the prompt… but meh~**

At Attention

Luffy sighed, watching the shore eagerly as the Straw hat's ship drew nearer. As their captain sat on the figurehead, waiting somewhat-patiently for them to drop anchor, the rest of the crew busied themselves with various tasks to keep their ship from being recognized. They'd already decided to drop anchor in a small bay, away from the docks due to an uncomfortably high number of marine ships already moored there.

They raised the sails and wound their flag around the mast—both acts in an attempt to better hide their mark. After all, none of them were particularly willing to fight with the marines if it could be avoided, and they all fully intended to go about their own business in town. As such, the ship would be guarded only by Usopp, who insisted that he wanted to stay on the ship to work on creating new ammo—and not because they had to travel through a scary-looking forest to _get_ to town—and no one on the ship doubted that he would sooner let their vessel be captured than fight the daunting number of marines on this island.

Nami glanced up to see their captain sitting on the figurehead, albeit on the very, _very_ tip of the figurehead's nose, but he was still on the ship. Which was odd. By now, she had expected him to launch himself onto the island and barrel off into the forest—either to get himself lost or into heaps of trouble. Or both. She'd already assured him that if he caused any trouble for the crew _whatsoever_ she would lock him away in the men's cabin until they reached the _next_ island. He'd nodded furiously then, and she'd assumed that that meant that he would be taking off for the island without another word.

Curious, she walked over to the figurehead and leaned casually against the rail.

"Hey Luffy."

"Hi." He replied quickly, eyes transfixed on the shore in front of him. Nami raised an eyebrow and, as casually as she could, gestured toward the island.

"Looks pretty cool, huh?" He nodded. "Looks like _quite_ the adventure." Her captain squirmed in his seat, either out of excitement, impatience, or both. She smirked. "Soooo… _Why_, might I ask, are you here… and not over there?" She gestured toward the island. Luffy whined, seeming impatient.

"Zoro said if I wait for him he'll buy me meat." He glanced around hurriedly then turned back to the island as though it may disappear if he looked away for too long, inching forward on his seat. Nami smirked and nodded, wondering why she'd never tried that tactic before. It seemed to be fairly effective, though she had a feeling that Luffy's reason for waiting had just as much to do with the Zoro as it did the meat.

She almost asked how Zoro intended to _pay_ for Luffy's 'meat', but remember the little drinking contest that they held a few nights before—first to drink twenty tankards owes the other five thousand beli. Admittedly, she'd lost, though it wasn't really her fault. After all, if Sanji hadn't decided that she was inebriated enough to, as Usopp put it, "make a move on her", and she hadn't distracted herself with the impossible task of beating some sense into him, Zoro wouldn't have won so easily.

She sighed as her captain inched forward _again_. She had no doubt that if Zoro kept him waiting too long, their captain would scoot himself straight off the figurehead and into the water, torn between the promise of meat and the adventure awaiting him.

Before she had a chance to see if her theory was correct, however, Luffy leapt to his feet with a splitting smile stretching from ear-to-ear and stretch his arm hurriedly over her right shoulder. A disgruntled noise behind her told her that the victim was Zoro.

"Have fun on your date." She chimed, earning somewhat of a feral growl from behind her.

Nami turned to look back at the swordsman, who was most certainly _not_ blushing, damn it, and quickly ducked her head, just as their captain's other arm stretched to grab hold of a crooked-looking tree on the shore, and the two took off in a blur of red and green.

Behind her, an outraged cry of "you bastards almost killed my Nami-san" followed in the two teen's wake, though they were already disappearing into the trees. Nami turned toward the cook with a half-smile on her face and the traces of something much darker in her eyes.

"_Your_ Nami-san?"

-----

Zoro smirked at his captain, who was busy stuffing his face for all that he was worth. Zoro had been smart enough to find a bar that had decent beer, as well as a buffet. Of course, this gave Zoro plenty of money left over to buy alcohol for himself. The buffet meant that while Luffy tried his hardest to eat the establishment out of house and home, Zoro could save some of his somewhat-hard-earned money. After all, he had no problems ignoring the death glare they were receiving from the owner of the bar every time Luffy went back to the buffet table.

That's what he got for putting up a sign that said "All you can eat" on the awning outside the bar.

Zoro drained the rest of his drink, just as Luffy placed another plate onto the stack between them. They both let out a contented sigh. Zoro grinned at the bartender and motioned for another beer as Luffy grabbed a plate of meat off the table next to him.

The owner of the plate glared at him, and _almost_ protested, but caught himself at the sight of the straw hat on his head, as well as the rather scary look he was getting from the his companion. He promptly decided that it was a buffet and he could always go back for more, leaving the two in peace to do just that.

"Thanks, Zoro!" Luffy said through mouthfuls. He grinned at his first mate, who shrugged it off casually. "This is great!"

"S'no big deal." He replied, taking a drink of the cup before him and grimacing at the taste. He frowned and put the cup down—the damn bartender was probably trying to spite him for eating all of the food off the buffet, although it was, admittedly, Luffy's doing and not his.

He would have complained and demanded a new cup if the doors hadn't swung open at that exact moment, revealing a rather arrogant-looking marine captain. Zoro's head snapped up at the sound, his eyes narrowing considerably. The man took a seat at the end of the bar, as far from the door as possible.

Once Zoro had decided that the captain hadn't seen them when he'd walked in, he stood, grabbing the collar of Luffy's shirt as the rubber boy tried to go back to the buffet for his eleventh helping. He started casually for the door, happy that the captain's back was to them, and that the bartender was more interested in seeing them leave than he was in seeing them arrested.

The two slipped outside without a word, and Zoro turned to the left as he attempted to put some distance between himself and the marine captain. It only took a few steps for him to realize that Luffy wasn't following. Irritated, he turned around to see said captain standing nose-to-nose with a stoic marine. Luffy was grinning widely, though the man gave no response. None. Not even the usual "it's Monkey D. Luffy! Capture him!"

Nope, he just stood there. _They, _actually, as Zoro noticed six other marines standing in a similar fashion. The swordsman raised an eyebrow, and walked toward his captain, though not without a wary hand resting on his swords. Luffy glanced over at Zoro with a look of utter glee on his face.

"They're like statues!" He beamed, poking the one nearest to him in the cheek to make a point. This earned him a twitch from the marine, though nothing more. Intrigued, Zoro waved a hand in front of another's face, wondering all the while if this was some kind of trap they'd thought up. Because if it was, these marines were bigger idiots than he'd originally thought.

Zoro smirked at the men. Every one of them had indecision written all over their faces. They seemed torn, probably between staying the way they were and attempting to capture the two notorious pirates before them. Along with the indecision, he noticed, was perhaps just a little bit of fear.

He watched as his captain poked the man before him a few more times—mostly in the cheek, and once in the eye—before he placed a hand on his shoulder.

"Come on, leave them be… we should get back." He said. Luffy pouted and gave the line of seven marines before him a lingering look before following after his swordsman.

"I wish all the marines were like that…" He hummed as he fell into step with the older teen. Zoro smirked.

"Hah, well, I have a feeling that if you tried that again—" Behind them, a door slammed open, creaking on its hinges, and silencing the swordsman mid-sentence.

"_You idiots!"_ They heard, even as the doors rebounded off the sides of the bar and the two pirates broke into a dead-run. "_Capture them_!"

"But sir, you said to stay at attention now matter wha—" The marine's protest was cut off by an angry snarl, and the seven men, as well as their captain, quickly ran after the fleeing pirates. Luffy laughed and grabbed Zoro's wrist as his first mate attempted to turn down a street that was in no way the direction they needed to go. They quickly ran down a back alley, and out the other end.

Luffy raised a hand in greeting as they passed Nami and Sanji, who had been, until that point, attempting to restock the ship. Despite the happy-go-lucky expression he wore, Luffy couldn't help but feel himself sweat at the collective looks he was receiving from the two. For some reason, he had a sinking feeling that he was going to die.

-----

Luffy gave broom in his navigator's hand a blank look. She had a stern, yet self-satisfied smirk on her face. He took it from her hesitantly.

"What is this?" Luffy asked. Nami tossed another broom to Zoro, who caught it and proceeded to glare at her.

"_This,_ Luffy, is the start of your punishment." Nami made a wide sweeping gesture at the deck. It was covered in discarded items, as well as debris, resulting from a lengthy fight with the marines. Luffy's jaw dropped at the sight.

"But you said that I'd be locked in the men's cabin." He reminded her.

"Yeah, I did say that. But since both you _and_ Zoro did something wrong, you're _both_ in trouble." A hopeful expression spread across Luffy's face.

"Well then why not just lock us both—" Luffy was cut off by Nami.

"Because that isn't punishment for you at all." She paused, "Actually, that's more like punishment for everyone else…"

Luffy pouted, glanced once between the broom and the deck, and then turned to Zoro with beseeching eyes, as though he should be able to get them out of this mess. Zoro simply shrugged and started sweeping, not really wanting to add onto his already unreasonable amount of debt.


End file.
